Thoughts on Toys from the Co-Founder of the Oppenheim Toy Portfolio

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Toyland Joins the Ethanol Debate: Lil' Gas Pump

I spend a great deal on the beach during the summer hanging out with a friend who is an energy expert – he’s a nuclear engineer by training and now puts together major energy deals. Two weeks ago I asked for a ten point plan–how do we fix our energy crisis. Our conversation got very heated (sorry)…I went home feeling depressed that we did not have a coherent plan that our smartest minds had put into place decades ago. Now we are left scrambling for stop gap solutions…

What does this possibly have to do toys? I came back to our office to discover that the traditional “gas pump” toy now has a very political energy agenda! The new Tonka Lil’ Gas Pump allows you to select your gas — one of the choices is ethanol! The box makes no mention of the corn based alternative–but the toy itself allows you to select ethanol by placing the corn logo in the down position. The back of the toy also has a diagram (done in plastic relief) showing how ethanol is made.